


End of the Line

by axilet



Category: Persona 3, Persona 4
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bad Ending, Community: badbadbathhouse, Crossover, Ensemble Cast, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Minor Character Death, Redemption
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-19
Updated: 2015-07-15
Packaged: 2017-11-29 19:43:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 9,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/690725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/axilet/pseuds/axilet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Months after Nanako's death, the fog still hasn't lifted, and strange reports are coming out from Inaba. Souji finally summons the courage to return to the place where it all started, driven by the compulsive need to find out the truth...and in so doing redeem himself and his friends. </p><p>Problem is, there's a time limit as the fog is spreading beyond the confines of Inaba. Fortunately for the Investigation Team, the head of the Kirijo Group is quick to take notice, as well as the appropriate measures.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Flashback

**Author's Note:**

> Bathhouse prompt: 
> 
> "P3 crossover?
> 
> The bad ending happened and Souji left. But in Inaba things get MUCH worse. The mist is everywhere and people can't get out or in. On the outside Souji is freaking out and the mystery of Inaba is everywhere on TV.  
> Inside the power was cut, blood is showing up in the weirdest places, the TV show a strange yellow place and everything has this green glow. 
> 
> The IT is sure, if this goes on like this it won't be long before the Shadows come to Inaba. And that would be BAD because everyone would be forced to face themselves and the IT can't be everywhere. And their leader isn't with them!
> 
> (Don't know if this is a P3 crossover, the situation in Inaba is a lot like the Dark Hour ans maybe Souji meets the SEES on his quest to get into Inaba)."

On the day he arrives, there is a death in Inaba.

She has a name, a face, a past, all lost and tangled together with her body high above the rooftops, and the fog parts, curtains at a show, so that all of Inaba can see.

Days later, another girl dies. The fog rises to applause. The story is riveting, the killer mysterious. Everyone is agog to know how the story will end.

The story ends three times. Once, with a boy trapped in a fantasy world; twice, with a man lost in delusions of grandeur; thrice, with the man’s escape from arrest. He is never caught. The fog descends, blocking out the sun. There is so much to talk about, it’s just a minor drawback.

This is how the story really ends.

The man is so shivering and helpless, it’s almost as if there isn’t enough blood on his hands to stain them wine red. He doesn’t move or cry out as they push him into the hell where he had damned so many others, and afterwards the screen just flickers once and goes black. He would have gone free if they hadn’t done it. It was the right thing to do.

The girl dies anyway. The bear who loves her goes away. Nothing changes and everyone does. Their faces are hidden by the fog. It’s the only way they can stand to look at one another.

There was a group of young men and women who jumped into another world and saved lives. No one knows what they did. No one will ever know or believe. But that’s all right, they know deep down inside. Deep down inside they know —

They murdered —

_It was the right thing to do._

He is glad to leave Inaba behind.

“Come and visit” — and it’s a lie in all their mouths. Just friends, wishing each other well. A good performance, but there’s no need to bother. No one is watching. The fog keeps their secret safe.

“I will,” he promises, and breaks it as he says it.

He boards the train, same as the beginning. But none of them can ever go back.

The train pulls away. They wave goodbye. Smile, wave, everything’s okay.

He doesn’t look back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First posted at the Bathhouse in Jan 2011. Since my interest in P4 has been revived with P4G, I'm trying to make a concerted effort at tackling my P4 longfics that eventually ended up going nowhere.
> 
> Will be editing the old chapters as I go along, so they won't be posted straight away.


	2. May 4th

Souji woke, sweat-soaked and shaking.

 Sleep was impossible; he rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. By now he knew every crack and stain practically by heart. His parents must have noticed the distinctive marks of his insomnia by now, not that he had put much effort into hiding them—but discreet as always, forbore to mention it. They probably thought it was because of _her_.

  _Nanako..._

 Five months later and he still couldn’t quite _get_ it, that she was really gone and that he wasn’t a Big Bro anymore. She was just an innocent little girl and he’d _let it happen,_ despite all his promises, the fantastic powers of gods and demons that he’d had at his disposal. He and his friends had fought their way through the mocking facsimile of Heaven that only the minds of a madman and an innocent child could have conjured up together but in the end they couldn’t save her from wasting away to that small frail body lying still and silent on the hospital bed in what should have been their hour of victory. The heart monitor going flat, Dojima-san’s screams and curses, the cold sterile air circulating through the newly ripped open chasm in his chest—these moments were lodged like shards of glass in his mind, cutting deep with every aching breath. _Nanako is dead,_ he told himself, deliberate; a twisting of a knife into tender flesh, his own bloody hand white-clenched around the hilt.

  _Namatame is dead._

 Hoisting Namatame on his own petard was at the time a darkly satisfying act of poetic justice the memory of which ultimately festered into a poisonous creeping cancer in his gut. His nightmares were _not_ of the death in that suffocating little room or even of the saccharine sweet illusion of Heaven caked over the ugly decay beneath but of the silence, the rippling TV screen where so many victims had torn open their hearts and souls and offered up their secrets on a bloody platter for the entertainment of a faceless hungry audience. Keeping guard as the portal shivered shut, he’d been infected for a fleeting moment with the terrible allure of Namatame’s unique brand of madness; how easy it had been, to kill and walk away with hands and conscience completely clean. More than that: he had been triumphantly, vindictively _righteous,_ judge and executor both of the monster who had killed his little sister, who had the sheer _gall_ to sit there limply and pathetically in utter incomprehension, never fighting back, not even once—

 Then, the crash and the burn. The dissociation, as though Souji had been merely a passive watcher at the movie of his life as the camera panned back. _Six murderers stand over the grave of their victim_ _looking in,_ the stage directions might have read. But it had been done, and could not be undone. It was over, Namatame’s confession the last sordid exposé the Midnight Channel would ever run. The doors to the Velvet Room disappeared, as well as the key that unlocked those doors. No more mysterious proclamations disturbed his sleep. The susurrus of the Personas nestled within him became faint whispers, a trickle, then a trick of the wind. It was over, so he boarded a train and left it all behind.

 But of course he hadn’t. Not really, not ever.

 Souji longed for cruelty, for indifference—even for Namatame’s iron certainty in his insane mission, anything that could exorcise the ghosts which constantly denied him rest. What obscene blasphemy, to be consumed with _more_   guilt over the killer than for his victim. But the inescapable truth was that if he could only wind back time he would have made a different choice, even if it meant Nanako dying without justice.

 In the company of his many regrets the night passed, slow and tortuous, into morning.

* * *

The TV was blaring when Souji descended from his room at a more socially acceptable hour. He never looked, just ate whatever his mother set down in front of him in sympathetic silence that made him want desperately to grind his teeth into his gums. He didn’t even hear what his father was saying, conversationally and with almost maniac early morning cheerfulness—something about the new term and the new school and new friends, as though he could just plaster the future over the past until he could pretend it didn’t exist -- then “Isn’t that about Inaba?” tossed a bucket of cold water over his head, shocking a rush of adrenaline into his veins that brought him instantly alert as the town’s mere mention always did.

 For a moment he wondered what had gone wrong with their TV, or maybe it was the camera -- then with a shock he recognized the sickly yellow hue of Inaba’s ill-omened fog _._ It clung to the styled wisps of the newscaster’s hair and the artful crease of her clothes; now and again she swiped one hand against her skin, an absent gesture as though she was brushing off a fly. “Good morning!” she chirped nonetheless, making a valiant effort at smiling professionalism. “Takahashi Sachiko, reporting live from outside Inaba...”

 Souji can only stare, the reporter’s words fading into a meaningless buzzing in his ears. His skin crawled with a sense of prickling unease _._ No, he realized. Not so meaningless after all. His eyes widened as Izanagi stirred sluggishly within him, too weak for even words but palpably there, like the first signs of spring after a long cold winter. He hadn’t thought he would ever hear Izanagi again, much less his other Personas, after...after the case was closed. A confusing tangle of relief threaded with dread tightened into a knot behind his ribs. What was his other self trying to tell him?

 “...a local natural phenomenon occurring every fifty years. Since last November a total of twenty-five people have been admitted to the local hospital complaining of various symptoms ranging from breathing difficulties to vivid hallucinations. Last week an employee of the supermarket giant Junes was attacked by a hysterical man in a gas mask claiming that the management was responsible. Fortunately the assailant was apprehended swiftly and no serious injuries were sustained.”

 “Ryotaro mentioned it when I called yesterday,” his mother commented. Unsaid was why she has been ringing up her brother so regularly, or the argument that the call had devolved into. “All these whacked-out conspiracy theories flying around...” She sighed. “It isn’t making his life any easier.”

  _Leave,_ she had said, almost shouting, angry. _What else is there in Inaba for you?_

 “...gas masks and canned food are flying off the shelves of stores immediately surrounding Inaba as the fog continues to spread. A few families have already self-evacuated though the majority have chosen to stay with their livelihoods for the immediate future. The governor issued a statement today appealing for calm while a special task force sent to the area makes headway into investigating the cause behind the fog...”

 The fog that had never gone away like it was supposed to. Souji had noticed, maybe exchanged a remark or two with his friends about it...but they’d all had much more important things to think about, at the time. Each of them absorbed in their own problems,  isolated islands in a sea of impenetrable fog...

 The pressure gripping his head intensified into a headache as Izanagi beat on the walls of his skull in warning. He _knew_ intimately this fear rising in him, choking his throat and clogging his lungs. He’d breathed it, agonized and obsessed over it until it birthed nightmares in his sleep that hunted him relentlessly into wakefulness. Everything should have ended with Namatame; the TV world,  the murders, the hysteria in the streets. If it hadn’t...

 Souji _stopped,_ poised on the edge of an abyss—completely and utterly paralyzed. Izanagi pushed him, hard; he pushed back with every ounce of strength he possessed, desperate and terrified of the epiphany threatening to break the darkness like a sudden dawn. _No,_ he thought. _No, no,_ no...

 “Souji!”

 Slowly, Souji uncurled his hands out of shaking fists, pressing them flat with deliberate control over his thighs. On the TV a meteorologist was expressing his deep confusion about improbable weather conditions defying everything he had ever learned while his interviewer nodded sympathetically. Souji honestly couldn’t care less but he would rather drop dead before turning around and looking at his parents, at their patronizing, understanding expressions. The expression his mother had given Dojima-san at both funerals, as though she had any insight into the grief he was suffering, as though she had any right to dictate what he could or could not feel, and pass judgment upon it.

  _No one understands,_ a dark ugly part of him snarled, the same part that had shouted at him to put Namatame in the TV , to make everything if not right then less wrong with one decisive stroke. _I was the LEADER, I had to do it, I had to carry a greater share of the burden than any other..._

 The expert’s prattling floated like oil on top of an increasingly awkward silence instead of filling it. He could sense them exchanging looks behind his back--at a loss to deal with a son they hadn’t seen in so long and who had returned so changed by an unimaginable tragedy. Finally his mother stepped up to the challenge—no doubt hardened by her failed negotiations with her brother, equally unable to move on though for different reasons. “Souji, if you need to talk to anyone...” she began.

 “No,” he said, cutting her off the pass. “This is something I have to work through by myself.”

 “If you could,” was her blunt response, “Why haven’t you?”

  _I just need more time._ The words, variations of the same answer he’d given mechanically again and again, stuck on the tip of his tongue. It had been _months._ Months in which the fog had fed and thrived on the paranoia it inspired, until it sprawled like a great unsated creature over the borders of its birthplace but still ravenous for more. In the belly of that beast were his friends, going through only god knew what. Things had quietly continued to go wrong while he had determinedly gone about his life on the other side of Japan, pushing the past year to the back of his head--his couldn’t be the first report they’d run on Inaba in the news. Why hadn’t the others called him? Told him they needed his help, given him an excuse to rush back...

 For the same reason, he reflected bitterly, he never came back to visit like he had promised.

  _Are they even still your friends?_  a little voice inside said nastily—one that sounded like it might get along well with yellow eyes and sharp, flashing teeth. _Do they even_ want _to be?_ He did his best to ignore it.

 He needed more time, but Souji suspected that Inaba had little more to give. _I have to go back,_ he realized, with a mixture of fear and elation churning in his stomach. Even if it killed him in the end, even if it damned him—he had to go back if he wanted to be rid of this miserable half-life with one foot planted always in Inaba, however long or short it might be, if the fog were to expand any more...

 His mother was still waiting, with their family’s typical patience. Souji answered, as honestly and hopefully as he was able.

 “There’s just one more thing I have to do,” he said. “Then, I think...I’ll probably be all right.”


	3. Interlude: Dramatis Personae

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet the cast, part one.

**Souji Seta** is sitting in a train, looking out of the window. He is the only one in the carriage. The countryside rushes past in a blur of green; the lulling hum of the engine grows louder and louder in his ears. Finally his eyes slip shut and his head falls against his chest. He dreams.

 **Yosuke Hanamura** is on shift, occupying his hands with busywork while his mind races—about last night, his father’s announcement. A year ago he would have been completely thrilled. Now he’s in turmoil. There’s just too much of his life here, the best and the worst of it and far too heavy for him to simply pack into his luggage to carry away. Fleetingly he imagines bumping into Souji one day out there in some vast, anonymous city—their eyes meeting through a sudden break in the crowd. Yosuke rehearses several awkward non-conversations in his head before he realizes the best case scenario would be for them to completely ignore each other, go on walking, and pray inwardly to never meet again for the rest of the lives. Deep down he’s already half in mourning. _Goodbye, Inaba. It’s been cool. Mostly._ He wonders if the others will even notice when he’s gone.

 **Yukiko Amagi** is in the lobby of her family’s inn, properly dressed and posed—hands tucked into the wide flowing sleeves of her kimono. It doesn’t matter that the only guests are a handful of reporters and conspiracy theorists, or that the fog creeping over the threshold of the open doors renders her efforts invisible to anyone within a hundred yards. The show has to go on; the inn must stay open as it always had, through the wars, the fog, even the end of the world.  The weight of tradition is an iron band around her ribs; the fog she draws in with every breath curdles in her chest, indistinguishable in taste from everything she has learned to lock away. Her throat works, her fingers tremble with the minutest of movements, the vibration of a single silken thread as a spider passes over it. Then she steadies in a well-practised balancing act. All this time she’s never stopped smiling.

 **Chie Satonaka** is lying stomach down on her bed, flicking listlessly through her movie collection, looking for—nostalgia, comfort. There’s none to be found.  Her real life heroes and real life heroics have failed her; the fictional ones just leave a sour taste in her mouth in the aftermath. Little girls don’t die in the movies, or if they do the heroes avenge them in a triumphant ending. If they feel bad about it it’s after the credits where the audience can’t see. Her body thrums with restless energy. She wants to run, push herself to her absolute limits until she drops, sore and tired and satisfied but the last time she had tried to go out she’d ended up doubled over, retching, drowning in a sea of fog. Her curtains are drawn tight over the barred windows and her door is locked. Here Chie suffocates instead in her cowardice, her helplessness. She tried to dial Yukiko’s number three times before giving up, and that’s just this morning. _Is everything ok, are_ you _ok_.  She doesn’t know what she’s more afraid to find out: that Yukiko needs her, or that she doesn’t, and never has.

 **Kanji Tatsumi** is working on a new doll. A cute little cat with button eyes and a stitched smile, with a smart blue cap and coat ready at the side. It’s so stupid. Disappointment means he was expecting _something_ , but what? She was here for the case, and now she’s gone halfway across the world for another. It’s not like she’s the only one. Rise lives just across the street but she might as well be on another planet for all the talking they do. Everyone’s drifted away into the fog, one by one, even Senpai who had encouraged him to be proud of himself and what he did. Kanji snaps one thread, harder than necessary. Senpai couldn’t look him in the eye, in the end. He wasn’t proud of what they had done. _It’s my fault too_ , he thinks, _don’t put it all on yourselves, save some for me too, you dumbasses_. That’s what he would say if they were here. But neither Naoto or Senpai had left any sort of contact information, leaving Kanji alone. It’s almost like the bad old days again, when everyone and himself included thought he was nothing more than a brainless thug. Except Senpai had left him something good, after all, given him the confidence to pursue being a man his own way instead of letting judgmental busybodies wear him down into the dirt. Kanji just wishes he could repay him, somehow. He wishes he had the courage to confess to Naoto, back when he’d had the opportunity. Then, practically, he bends his head back to his work.

 **Rise Kujikawa** is behind the counter of her grandmother’s tofu store. Elbows propped on the well-polished top she stares ahead into the comforting blankness of the fog—there’s no need to keep up the act here, where her grandma can’t see. The headache pulses slowly in her head, just above the level of her ears—as if someone had her skull in a vise, and was twisting it open and shut in a maddening, arrhythmic pattern. Aspirin doesn’t help, and when she does manage to sleep her dreams are filled with bizarre imagery that leave her trembling and confused when she wakes. Worst is when she wakes calling for Senpai. She had really liked him. More than liked him, maybe. But that was before she had seen him angry, so angry that day in the hospital room until he could barely speak the fatal words. And that was fine, it was ordinary to feel that way. She’d been angry and upset too. They had all loved Nanako, they all hated her murderer with equal passion. But part of her had thought of him as _more_ than ordinary. He was special, different from the other boys until that moment where her mental image of him had crashed and burned. That’s fine too. She understands, as someone with a mask of her own. Cheerful, bubbly, perfect Risette whom all her fans had loved. If only she’d realized sooner how close to the breaking point he really was, under that prenatural calm and poise. Her head throbs again, sharply. Tears spring to her eyes. Perhaps nothing would have changed. But at least she would have tried.  

 **Naoto Shirogane** is far away in another city, another country where foggy Inaba is of little consequence or value to the twenty-four hour news stations. Elbow-deep in the bloody guts of a murder investigation she has no attention left over to spare for another one, especially one that is emphatically stamped _CLOSED_ in her mind. The case is complicated by the suspect, a sweet-faced young woman pleading innocence. She has more than her fair share of advocates; Naoto has her doubts. Gender, physical attractiveness, age, education—irrelevant. There is only the turbulent complexity of human nature, the push and pull of oftentimes nebulous motive that draws forth one facet or another out of the darkness into light. Given sufficient incentive humans are capable of the greatest kindnesses or the most monstrous of evils; a pendulum swinging from one extreme to the other. Her particular line of work has always inclined Naoto to look first for the latter side. Since Inaba she has developed something of an obsession. What had been metaphor had become reality in the twisted tormented shape of her Shadow, spilling secrets she’d made herself forget. She wonders what she’ll hear if she pushes the suspect into the TV. Everyone is guilty of something. Abruptly Naoto realizes she’s let herself become distracted—again. She ignores her grandfather’s concerned gaze and goes back to work, biting viciously down on the tip of her pen.

 **Mitsuru Kirijo** is lost in reminiscences both pleasant and unpleasant. There is no bloody moon in the sky or coffins full of sleeping people lining the streets,  no irreverent chatter from SEES over Fuuka’s communication lines in open defiance of the grim atmosphere. Nevertheless stepping from the limousine for a moment she feels vividly as if she has been transported through both space and time, and a glance over her shoulder will reveal Tartarus resurrected, a tall skeletal finger stabbing accusingly at the sky, calling down Nyx to render her judgment on humanity. In the present the Dark Hour is ended, SEES disbanded, everyone gone their separate ways to live out their lives; her family’s debts to humanity repaid in blood and deed. They have even made peace with their losses, including the most grievous loss of them all. But now she feels her body instinctively shifting into a fighting stance, one hand reaching for a gun that isn’t there. An electric hum flickers over her skin; Artemisia turns over in her mind, whispering into her ear, a warm presence that chases away the chill of the fog. Something is very wrong here.

 **??????** is walking and walking and walking. It’s very important to keep on walking. One foot forward, then the next. Careful, he’s got to be careful. He dropped his name somewhere back along the road but when he tried to turn back it was already lost in the mist. He’s lost other things too, little bits and pieces: buttons, color, his voice. Something something. Smoke in the mist. If he’s not careful he’ll drop himself and then he’ll be gone forever. He’s so tired, his feet are sore but that’s good because that’s how he knows they still exist. One foot forward, then the next, again and again. The road rolls on into the horizon. He keeps walking. If he listens, he thinks he can hear something in the distance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keeping to the theme of the bad ending, not everyone has completed their social links with Souji. 
> 
> Next chapter was already previously posted to the bathhouse, it just needs editing.
> 
> Edit 15/07/15: Added the final line to Teddie's part.


	4. May 5th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which both Mitsuru and Souji revisit old friends.

“Kirijo-san?”

Mitsuru acknowledged her assistant with a nod of her head, eyes still fixed on the road winding down the hillside toward the stricken town. Artemisia whispered restlessly in her head, her other self frustrated at their inability to pierce both the literal and metaphorical fog which clouded their usually clear sight. There was a mystery here that ran deeper than the bizarre ritualistic murders that had haunted Inaba the past year, and she was uneasily aware of time running out as hands spun away on an unseen clock. If only she could have anticipated this sooner—interpreted the case as something worthy of her company’s special attentions rather than merely those of the local authorities. Long unused instincts were sparking in a way that they had not since the thirteenth hour had ended, and it was all she could do to remain outwardly neutral. Artemisia was humming like a live wire under her skin in preparation for the threat she could not see but sensed hovering around them like a shroud; Mitsuru would not be surprised if the file she was holding were to freeze solid and shatter right then and there in her tense grip.

Reluctantly, she turned away from the view, surrendering her valuable notes to her assistant before she could inadvertently destroy them. “Has the meeting begun?” she asked.

“Only just.” Kazuko imparted this information together with a slightly reproachful look at her employer's rudeness in being tardy. Mitsuru acknowledged the reprimand with a rueful smile as they began the walk back to the encampment. Officially she was here in her capacity as head of one of Japan’s largest biotech and pharmaceutical companies to alleviate the problems caused by the strange fog, and if possible eradicate the phenomenon altogether. Uncertain of when their efforts to destroy the Dark Hour would come to fruition, her father had helped fund research into finding a more mundane solution to arresting, or at least slowing, the spread of Apathy Syndrome. The project had been abandoned upon the victims’ complete recovery—only to be restarted a scant two years later as one by one reports of fatigue, hysteria and depression had come out of Inaba and its surrounding areas—not exactly the same, but similar enough to bring in the Kirijo Group on a respectable pretext, and give them enough leeway to conduct other, far more unorthodox investigations.

Sighing, she dropped her hand down to touch the phone in her purse. It had been difficult enough resuming a normal life in the wake of all they had seen and experienced, their triumphs and their losses; she was reluctant to disrupt the tenuous peace the former members of SEES had found for themselves. The immediate threat vanquished, the blight on her family name redeemed—Mitsuru had nevertheless found it difficult to shake off the responsibilities her father had assumed and passed down to her, in light of the superior resources and knowledge available to her as heir of the Kirijo empire. Nevertheless, it was a relief to do so out of her own volition as opposed to the powerful sense of guilt that had both driven her and trapped her since she was old enough to understand what her grandfather had done.

This was the choice she had made, and with gladness. And yet, if she called, and they agreed to help...would they be doing so of their own free will, or out of a sense of obligation to their friendship? Or would they feel pressured by the burden of the power they possessed? Doubtless they had heard of the incident—a not insignificant number of news networks in Japan had devoted several segments to the mystery of Inaba—but not of its potential connection to the Shadows. Should they be told? Should they not be free to make their own decisions, a right denied by her withholding of this intelligence?

 _This fog was raised by one who would deny us the truth_ , her other self murmured, soft as a breath of wind through her mind. _Would you similarly deny your friends?_

Mitsuru exhaled, raised her hand. In it was her phone, clutched in fingers white with strain.

Perhaps, it would be best to begin with recruiting another pair of eyes to the cause.

* * *

 

As he had once done in another train and in another lifetime, Souji dreamed...

“Welcome back...” whispered a familiar voice, one he had thought he would never hear again. “...to the Velvet Room.”

“Welcome,” Margaret echoed; but her eyes were cold, and there was a distance between them that had outgrown the bond he had forged with her months ago. The space Isis had occupied was dark and silent; over time the buzz and chatter in his mind had faded until there remained for certainty only Izanagi, his other self; though of late he had to wonder - if he had difficulty meeting his own eyes in the mirror, if he felt this much self-loathing and regret, did that not mean he had lost control of his Persona? Upon his next trip into the TV world, would calling up his blue card yield only his yellow-eyed doppelganger, the murderer he so feared lived inside him?

Souji was tired of being afraid. He was afraid, now, of the inhabitants of the Velvet Room, forcibly reminded with their displeasure of their basic inhumanity, their alienness. It was hard to remember how he had pleased Margaret with the scope and variety of the menagerie he had found within himself, every summon a cutting and polishing of the many facets of his being. until they flared to vibrant life. Souji had never even imagined himself to have such depths before he had come to Inaba. All his life, he had been the nice boy, the polite boy in class; the well-behaved son who would go far...a stereotype, dull but safe. He had worn the mask for so long that until he arrived in Inaba he had forgotten that it had never been his true face.

And yet...

_Somehow, he had cheated._

Souji could feel Izanagi like he had never before, pacing and stretching against the confines of his skull like a caged tiger. Izanagi, the Persona he had not earned, the Shadow he had never faced. Both of them trembled, caught on an invisible precipice over a terrifying abyss. Part of him would always live in that moment, that point of no return; watching his eyes in the blank TV screen as the ripples fell still, waiting until his lungs hurt for them to flash golden yellow.

“Are you finally ready to face the truth?” Igor asked, softly, his strange eyes intent. “Are you ready to stop running?”

Souji wanted to protest, _I’ve already made my decision to return._ But it’s more than that, he knew, in a sudden flash of insight that struck his nerves with the dawning realization that he until now had still refused to see. He was returning because it wasn’t over. It wasn’t over because...

“...it wasn’t Namatame who was behind this,” he said aloud, forcing the words through the tightness of his throat. Something in him shattered, the last of the comforting illusions; and rained down in shards of glass that cut deep into his soft, vulnerable parts where they bled red with guilt and horror. “We stopped the wrong man. We...we...”

 _We_ murdered _him._

His heart thundered in his ears as he sat numbly, clenching his hands into fists, looking away from the condemnation he richly deserved. It was only the vibration of this surroundings that jolted him back into awareness, the resuming of a sound he had not been aware had stopped—the rumbling of an engine purring back into life. Only now did he understand that the car had not been moving, stalled on the side of the misty road and going nowhere—until now.

“Your journey, long interrupted, has resumed,” Margaret murmured. “Go forth, Souji, to find out the truth hidden in the fog...and, in so doing, attain redemption for yourself and your friends.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LONG TIME NO SEE. This was the last chapter I wrote for badbadbathhouse, posted in June 2012. At this point I have no idea if I will ever finish this fic or write anymore but I might as well export over everything anyway...


	5. May 5th, Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Souji meets up again with his uncle.

Souji was the only passenger to disembark. He hefted his bag over his shoulder, ignoring the many public safety signs posted all over the station, and began to walk; past the deserted canteen, the empty taxi stand; without a glance past the place where he had first met Dojima-san and Nanako-chan hiding behind her father’s leg. Then he stopped and waited, until he saw the headlights coming up the road.

“Uncle,” he said, raising a hand in greeting as Dojima emerged from his car. “I’m sorry to make you come all this way.”

“I’m surprised you came back all this way.” The silhouette of Souji’s uncle leaned on the wing mirror, expression veiled. The Hierophant link Souji had built so carefully with him had shattered in an instant on the night Nanako died, and months later they felt the broken edges of that still, prodding into tender wounds that had never healed. Dojima blamed him for her death, in a vague, indefinable way that made him all the more resentful that he could not voice his suspicions, and Souji could not voice his denial. In truth, he _felt_ responsible. If only he had managed to answer his uncle’s questions more satisfactorily, if only he had ordered his friends to station themselves around the house sooner, if only he had made Nanako promise not to open the door on any condition that night, even if it was her mother’s ghost knocking…if only they had been faster, stronger, smarter...

Dojima continued, “Your mother has been trying to get me out of Inaba for months, and now she sends her son back to me, when I no longer have my own daughter? What on earth am I supposed to make of this?” He made a funny little sound, almost like a laugh cut short by a gasp, and Souji wished desperately to see his face. To just see through the blasted fog, to cut everything away, as he had once slashed so many Shadows to ribbons with Izanagi’s finely honed blade.

Instead he had to settle for the sound of his voice, as low and sincere as he could make it, a weapon in its own right. He stepped closer, emboldened when Dojima made no move to step away in turn. “Uncle, I’m here to finally be honest with you.”

“About?”

“You know what about,” Souji said.

Dojima took in a sharp breath -- a whole lungful of the poisonous yellow atmosphere, Souji thought, almost flinching at the thought. With Izanagi on speaking terms again, perhaps he would be immune to its mind-altering properties but he could never be sure. Again like a vision he saw his hands around Namatame’s shoulders directing them both to their doom, the television screen yawning ahead like an inescapable abyss. Was it the fog, then, already like a shroud upon Inaba, that had driven him to murder? Or was it his own rage and grief lashing out at the nearest acceptable target, his dark Shadow at the heart of every self? Souji didn’t know, could never know. Whatever had driven him, he was at his destination and he had to go on from there. 

“Whatever you have to say,” Dojima said, nearly spitting the words out, “it’s worthless. You hear me? Worth less than nothing. Maybe back then, if you had decided to be _honest_ …” He seemed to sag then, head slumping over his arms. “Just...leave Inaba for good, Souji. Go back home, as far away from this crap as you can. I wish to Heaven,” he said, in brutal echo of the honesty Souji had offered, “Nanako and I had never set eyes on you."

Souji really did flinch this time. His eyes stung and blurred, and in his head he heard the rattle of the Hierophant chain, rusty and discordant where the old intimacies had frayed. Where was that coffee mug now, he wondered, the one with his name on it, the one that marked him as part of the family? Long buried in a landfill somewhere, probably, while Dojima would still keep Nanako’s in a drawer, where he could look at it safely inoculated by an alcoholic haze. Even as Souji had convinced him to finally set aside his obsession with his wife’s killer for Nanako’s sake, a new obsession had set in that would haunt him for the rest of his life.

_I have to make this right._

“Dojima-san,” Souji said quietly, forcing himself to stay in control, “Listen to me, please. This would all have happened whether I was here or not. My friends and I...we are _not_ responsible for what Nanako-chan went through. In fact, we did our best to save her. We went through hell fighting monsters to reach her, and I don’t blame you in the slightest for being angry at us for not making it in time…but we did our damnedest. All of us, who had come to love and care for Nanako-chan, as she came to love and care for us, for her ‘Big Bro’...” His voice cracked on the words, and he had to bite down hard on his lower lip for a moment to keep from crying. “Don’t you dare discount that. Don’t you dare say that it meant nothing, that you can just walk away from it now that your daughter’s happiness causes you pain instead.”

“ _You_ dare,” Dojima said, low and threatening, his body straightening, “after all this time, you're still spouting off those fantastical stories of yours that you claim is the _truth_ , using Nanako’s name no less...I could kill you. I really could, my sister’s son or not.” Something dark crept through his voice, cold and insidious and frighteningly  _familiar_. “And in this fog, who the hell would find out? Who the hell would _care_?”

“You would, Dojima-san,” Souji said. “When the fog rises, you would care very much, and you would regret what you have done.  And I intend to do everything I can to lift the fog.”

Dojima glared, disconcerted by Souji’s response but not derailed. “What? What does the weather have to do with anything?”

“Everything.” Souji set the bag gently down by his feet. “Excuse me, let me try something.”

 _This had better work_ , he told himself fervently, holding out his hand. He’d hoped for a calmer talk with Dojima-san in the living room together with his TV, but if he was right about the nature of the fog…

Blue light bloomed in his palm. Souji crushed the card, inclining his head backward to meet the measured gaze of his Persona, Izanagi, his black coat flapping in the wind, his silver sword sharp and gleaming as though less than a day had passed since its last use. Despite the circumstances joy filled his heart in an exhilarating rush, prompting a wild grin to spread across his face; it had truly been too long. “I’ve missed you,” he murmured.

Izanagi nodded to him and then past him, at a shocked Dojima, his jaw hanging open, eyes huge. At Souji’s direction the Persona darted down and slashed his sword down at the ground before vanishing, leaving nephew and uncle to contemplate together the unmistakable gouge in the concrete.

“You...what…” All of Dojima’s rage seemed to have been completely knocked out of him, and his words, at once; he could only gesture weakly at the space Izanagi had occupied. It took him another ten seconds to gather sufficient wits to blurt out, “ _What the fuck was that_?”

“What we used to defeat the creatures in Namatame’s mind,” Souji said. He caught his uncle’s gaze and held it. “Will you listen to me now, Uncle?”

Dojima was silent for a long moment, looking inward. Then he came to a decision and nodded stiffly. “All right,” he said, opening the car door on the passenger side. “I’ll give you half an hour.”

“Thank you,” Souji said, getting in.

“Don’t thank me yet,” Dojima grated. “You might have just handed me about a dozen more reasons to be pissed off at you and your friends.”

Souji grimaced. _Try a hundred_. But he still smiled to himself, anyway, as golden scales slithered through his mind, accompanied by a dragon's muted roar.

* * *

Not too far away, Artemisia lifted her head and said to her other self, _There is another like you in this place_.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's really something to be said for writing a story I haven't planned out at all. Usually I tend to agonize over the smallest details, and then a one-shot ends up taking a year to finish (like the Saki one I just posted) only after I take a break and gain some perspective. 
> 
> For instance, one of the big problems I had with even *starting* this chapter was so how do Mitsuru and SEES meet up with the IT??? Then I thought eff it and just write and the solution emerged naturally as I was typing the ending - Souji has to summon Izanagi to convince Dojima and so of course Artemisia senses it :D Writing is so frustrating but things like this is what makes it so rewarding too :D
> 
> Lastly: fog fog fog fog fog. Seriously I have to find a better way to say this or just avoid writing the word.


	6. May 5th & 6th

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dojima and Souji both talk and not-talk.

At the end, Dojima sat with his head in his hands, looking tired and desperately in need of a drink or several. “This is all true?” he said without moving.

“All true,” Souji said. “I promised.”

Several times during the tale he’d been obliged to get up and put his hand into the television, until Dojima could no longer dispute the evidence his eyes were showing him. “Either that,” he answered bitterly, “Or this damned fog’s passing your crazy onto me, because heaven help me, I actually believe you.”

“Thank you,” Souji said, mostly to the second half of that statement.

His uncle smiled, a sardonic twist of his mouth. “No, I should be thanking _you_ , isn’t it? You’re the big damn hero who jumped into another dimension to rescue Nanako while I rotted away in a hospital bed. You’re the one who got justice for her, even if you couldn’t save her in the end…”

“That isn’t something to be proud of,” Souji said quietly, disquieted by the expression on Dojima’s face, the quality of the light in his tired, hollow eyes. This definitely wasn’t how he had wanted to regain Dojima’s regard. Even beyond the influence of the fog, Dojima remained a grieving father. Souji knew from personal experience what it had done to his own self, and he had never loved Nanako the way Dojima had, as his daughter, the hope of his future and the last living remnant of his wife. “I already explained--”

“You explained he took Nanako into this TV world,” Dojima said sharply. “Whatever his reasons, he did that. He as good as killed her.” He deflated a little, ran a hand through his hair and then kept it there so its shadow slanted across his eyes, hiding them. “You’re right,” he admitted after a pause into the fraught silence, low-voiced. “It’s not something to be proud of. I know it’s wrong, especially coming from a police officer, but I’m glad he’s dead. I’m glad that bastard’s dead,” he repeated, almost defiantly. “I just wish I was the one that had done it. I’m already ruined, anyway, but you…you deserve better.”

“Uncle…” Souji began and then stopped, at a loss for words, and his throat would have closed over them anyway even if he could find some. He didn’t know which was worse: Dojima’s hatred, or his approval.

Dojima stood up abruptly, his body angled away. “It’s late,” he said. “We can talk more in the morning when we’ve had some rest. You can have your old room again, if you want.”

“I think,” Souji said, “I would prefer to stay on the sofa.”

“Suit yourself.” His uncle inclined his head, then turned and went up the stairs.

In the dark Souji lay down under a borrowed blanket and shut his eyes, breathing in raggedly. The old smells, the old sounds of the house around him were agonizingly familiar despite a year away, yet agonizingly alien. This was a house in mourning, a house that had lost its heart. While he shared its grief, this was no longer _home_ the way it had once been.

Before Inaba Souji had been a transient creature, forever following his parents to schools around Japan or staying with relatives when they went overseas. It had been a long time since he had thought of anywhere as somewhere he could belong. Not since he had been a child and his parents had to explain to him why he couldn’t bring all his playmates along with them to this strange new place. And since he never had any trouble making friends wherever he went, gradually the concept of relationships that didn’t die a natural death or adapt to long-distance grew academic to him, existing in theory but not in practice. He had everything he needed or wanted out of life until the day he narrowly escaped death with Yosuke Hanamura and Chie Satonaka and felt the tug of the first link in the chain that would come to bind him and his friends together, an anchor sunk deep in the sea of unconsciousness.

It was in the nature of chains to hold and to imprison, for good or for ill; Souji, finally drawn back to Inaba after all his efforts to stay away, found that he could not regret too badly the loss of his freedom despite all the pain he had experienced, the pain he was experiencing now. In the morning he would have to face Dojima again, and then, unable to put it off any longer, he would have to round up as much of the IT that could bear to face _him_. He could not blame them, if they refused or slammed their doors shut without even the courtesy of a verbal refusal. He had been the leader and it was his hands that were dirtiest with Namatame’s blood.

Eventually he succumbed to an uneasy sleep where he was still on the train to Inaba; only, instead of reaching its destination the train went on forever on tracks that had been rearranged into a giant, unending circle, while he sat looking through the window with unknowing patience, waiting for the sign to appear.

* * *

Souji scrounged up breakfast from Dojima's meagre supplies, almost preparing a third portion before catching himself--and proceeded to endure an uncomfortable meal where both of them would start to catch each other’s eye and then think better of it before saying anything. It was only near the end that Dojima bit the bullet: “Are you planning to bring those kids here?”

“No,” Souji said, addressing as diplomatically as possible the obvious source of Dojima’s concern: the less than ideal state of the house and of Dojima himself, rendered unavoidably clear even in the obscured light of day. He gestured vaguely with one hand. “We have...we had a regular meeting place at the Junes food court; that’s where we’ll go.” _We._ Such an optimistic word.

Dojima bit back a wince at the name _Junes_ , a muscle fluttering briefly in one unshaven cheek. “Outside in the fog? Isn't it supposed to be dangerous?"

“It shouldn’t be to people who have already faced their Shadows,” Souji said with more confidence than he felt. 

“Which I haven’t,” Dojima said grimly. “So your advice to me would be to stay at home safe and sound doing nothing. Is that it?" Unspoken, between them: _just like I was, when Nanako died._

Swallowing, Souji gave in to his brewing suspicions and acknowledged the elephant in the room. “What about your job?”

“Haven’t you guessed?” Dojima said with a bitter smile. “I’m on leave--or more accurately, I’ve been _put_ on leave. Indefinitely.”

"Adachi," Souji said. "What about him, can't he speak up for you or--"

"Disappeared." Dojima spat the word in disgust. "Just upped and left, without even a note. He always said he hated this town, but I never imagined he would..." His voice faltered, hurt only briefly showing before the anger rose again. “You’re right, damn you,” he said with a sudden, sullen fury. “All of you. I’m no good to anyone in this _pathetic_ state.” His face twisted, and for a horrifying second Souji was certain he was about to weep, but instead he took a deep breath and composed himself with all the strength he could muster.

“Uncle, you wouldn’t be any good to me even in your best health,” Souji said as kindly as he could, reaching across the table to clasp Dojima’s shoulder, to soften the blow. “The Shadows can only be damaged by Personas. Your gun, your police training--they’re of no use in this situation.”

“What would it take then,” Dojima said, his words slow and heavy, “to gain a Persona?” He looked up quickly before Souji could turn and escape the intensity of his gaze. “Isn’t it as simple as entering this TV world and waiting?”

“ _No_ ,” Souji said at once, faster than thought. “It would break you.” He stumbled a little at Dojima’s scorching glare but soldiered on. “The TV world breaks _everyone_ ,” he said, “and if you’re lucky it puts all the pieces back together. Whoever made this world--” and he’s certain by now that there’s someone, something out there, watching, and maybe laughing--“didn’t do it for our benefit. Saki Konishi and Mayumi Yamano weren’t lucky. My team members almost weren’t lucky. Please. I can’t lose you.” _I can’t lose you_ as well.

Dojima studied him, the harsh lines of his face softening. He sighed, withdrawing both literally and metaphorically. “All right, all right, I understand. It's simply..." He paused to arrange his thoughts into order, and started again, speaking as though every word was a block to be forced out of his throat. "This past year, it feels like I've been living in a dream. Now that I've woken up, thanks to you, my greatest fear is that I'll fall asleep again." He shook his head, mouth tightening. "I was ready to hurt you last night, at the very least," he said. "My own nephew, my sister's son...that was what I had become."

"That wasn't your normal state of mind," Souji said, "nor were my friends in their normal states of mind when their Shadows tried to kill me." He smiled awkwardly, squeezing once before letting go. "It's become something of a bonding ritual, so believe me when I say I don't blame you."

Dojima cracked a small smile at last. "I'm trying to apologize here," he said, "so I'd appreciate it if you stop reminding me why I should be angry with you."

They laughed. It was soft and uncertain laughter, but it ended with them a little more at ease with each other, and while they cleared the table Dojima gave an update on the former members of the Investigation Team. Teddie was still missing; Naoto was in London on a case; and as Junes was closing down it was likely that the Hanamuras would not be staying long after, a nasty surprise that in retrospect Souji should have anticipated given the store's troubles he'd seen in the news.

“One more thing,” Dojima called as Souji swung the front door open, grimacing at the fingers of fog already creeping in, curling possessively around the frame.

“Yes?”

“Keep me updated on what's going on," Dojima said, low and fierce. "Even if it's bad. You promised to be honest with me."

“I did,” Souji agreed, and slipping Teddie's glasses over his eyes like a shield went out into the foggy street.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, it only took me a month to update this time...yay me? Next chapter should be meatier, finally bringing in the IT.
> 
> edit 03/10 - forgot to mention Adachi in the original version--somewhat awkwardly inserted now.


	7. Interlude: The Magician and The Star

_“You have to get out of the car,” his father is saying. “We can’t leave with you.” and Yosuke looks down, his hands full of chain links, connecting him forever and always to Inaba--_

_"Yoh-_ suke! Yosuke! Wake up!”

Yosuke groaned, turning over and burying his face into the pillow without bothering to open his eyes. “Go ‘way” he mumbled, not knowing what time it was other than _stupid early._ Vaguely something niggled at the back of his mind but he’s too tired to pursue it, already sinking back into the comforting fuzziness of sleep--

 “ _Argh!”_

 Yosuke rose a dripping figure of wrath, hands clenched around empty air. _“_ I’m going to skin you and wear you, bear! _”_ he shouted--or started to shout, the words sticking in his throat as it suddenly dawned on him what was wrong with the whole picture. He stared jaw agape as Teddie tossed aside the bucket and beamed, arms thrown wide open.

 “It’s me, Yosuke!” he cried out dramatically. “I’m _bearrrr-ck!_ Your beary favorite bear!”

 Yosuke wheezed slightly, finally remembering he needed to breathe just in time for an enthusiastic Teddie to cannonball into him, costume and all, sending them both crashing back into the bed. “Sorry but I was too excited!” Teddie gushed, not sounding sorry at all. “I’ve missed you so much, Yosuke! I’ve missed all of you...so much!” He sobbed, with a good deal less drama and something more real.

Yosuke gingerly patted the trembling boy on his back, the soft warm fur under his fingers going a long way to clearing up his shock and disbelief. “Teddie...” he said, barely able to recognize his voice as it emerged, choked and rusty as a clogged drain. Shit, it had been so long since he had really... _felt_ anything other than numb resignation that he was more than a little overwhelmed. He focused...on the burning in his lungs and the weight crushing his ribs. Right. Priorities.

“I missed...you too,” he managed. “Get off me...so we can...talk…okay?”

Teddie gave one last bone-grinding squeeze and rolled off. Yosuke sat up creakily, eyeing the mess that had once been his bed. They had made a bit of a commotion and briefly he wondered why his parents weren’t rushing to investigate. His mood darkened; they probably had heard but didn’t _care._ The same way he hadn’t really cared, hadn’t found any reasons to care about anything…

The fog was starting to creep back in, heavy and soporific, and with effort he forced it back with his eyes fixed firmly on Teddie in his ridiculous, colorful suit, now seated expectantly at the foot of his futon. “Teddie, why did you go?” he asked, the words spilling out in a rush. “We looked everywhere for you, you dumb bear!” The memory of those nightmarish days was almost enough to make him want to slip under again, but first he had to _know._ “You even made the girls cry, they were so worried.” _Maybe_ he’d shed a tear or two himself, but mention it to Teddie and he’d never hear the end of it.

Teddie’s smile dimmed and his ears drooped. “I’m sorry, Yosuke,” he said. “After...after Nanako-chan…” His paws went to his head and he hunched, the cartoon frown on his mask a sharp contrast to the grief in his voice. “I went back inside the TV, I was so sad...Yosuke, I was beary happy being around all of you, it was so much better being a Shadow...but feeling so sad was _worse_ than being a Shadow!” he burst out. “If only my nose was stronger, we could have found her faster...I couldn’t stand it, Yosuke, I thought I would rather return to being a Shadow than feel so sad again…I’m sorry, Yosuke, I know that you’re angry with me...”

Yosuke listened in mounting horror. At the end of it he hit Teddie on the head, hard enough to make him rock backward, then grabbed him in a rough hug. “Stupid, don’t say that again!” he said loudly. “If Chie heard you say that, she’d punt you to the moon for sure. We’re _friends,_ you don’t leave friends behind no matter what. I’m…” He shook his head, forcing himself to calm down as Teddie wilted. “I’m not angry, Teddie. I get it…” His voice petered out as he realized how similar their stories were. How he had been going around in a daze, thinking of nothing except running away and forgetting what had happened. Pushing everything behind a wall because he couldn’t tear it out. It had been so easy to hide, especially once the fog had come down. “I really get it. Just _never_ do it again, okay?”

Come to think of it, _why_ was it still so foggy? He didn’t think weather worked like that, even with Inaba’s unique brand of weirdness thrown in.

He lost his train of thought as Teddie popped his head up, his eyes shining. “Okay, I promise! Do you really mean that, Yosuke?” he chirped, mood spun a complete 180 degrees. “Aww, I knew you couldn’t resist my soft fur…! my ado _bear_ le personality! my winning smile…!”

“Gah!” Yosuke fended off the clingy octopus suddenly occupying his bed, secretly relieved. Under all his annoying habits and references to scoring with girls Teddie was practically a baby, and it was just... _wrong_...to see him upset or burdened in any way, like Bambi getting shot or something. “That’s Kanji, not me! You’ve got the wrong guy!” He pushed Teddie away and, now that the emergency was over, quickly established proper guy-guy distance. “It’s only because you decided to come back,” he said, projecting sternness. “You’re still on probation, bear.”

“Yosuke…” Teddie looked down, a little teary. “I promised to be a good bear, so I have to tell the truth. I _didn’t_ decide to come back.”

Yosuke blinked. “What?”

“I got lost,” Teddie said, hanging his head. “I couldn’t find the way back even if I wanted.” He paused. “I kept dropping stuff. Or they fell off by themselves. Like the color of the sky, the taste of ice-cream…” He quieted, and Yosuke thought he would have to intervene before Teddie brightened. “But then a big blue car drove past!”

Yosuke blinked again. “What?”

“A lady came out and she said, “I believe these belong to you.”” Teddie blushed. “She was _beary_ pretty, and _beary_ nice. She gave me back all the things I had dropped, and she asked if there was anything else I was missing. That’s when I started thinking about you and Yukiko and Chie and Naoto and Rise and Kanji and Senpai, even Nanako-chan...and I felt so lonely and unhappy. I was wrong, Yosuke…even being sad is better than being a Shadow! It’s better than being nothing at all!” He clenched his paws. “So I asked for a lift home, and that’s how I got here, thanks to Margaret-chan!”

Yosuke resisted the urge to say, “That’s _crazy._ ” A guy who jumped into TVs and fought physical projections of Inaba’s collective subconscious with the aid of a disco frog had probably permanently lost the right to say that. “What kind of car can fit through a TV screen?” he protested instead, rather feebly to his own ears.

Teddie looked at Yosuke like he’d grown a second head. “A _special_ car, of course. Margaret-chan is a very special lady. She’s even good friends with Sensei.”

The hits just kept on coming. Before Yosuke could even process _that_ , Teddie continued cheerfully, “And that’s how she knows Sensei is on his way to visit us right now. I bet you can’t wait to see him too!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M SO BEARY BEARY SORRY TOO PLEASE FORGIVE ME FOR THE LONG WAIT D:
> 
> ETA 20/07: I've just realized my timeline is seriously, seriously messed up. Will iron out the deets first before I finish the next chapter.


End file.
